Life

IRONMAN Offers Chance to Believe Again

An Australian cancer survivor has found belief and confidence through IRONMAN training and racing.

By Daniel Hoy

When RaeJean Pearce was diagnosed with breast cancer she felt that she had lost all control over her future. Regardless of the decisions made on treatment, in the end whatever happened was not up to her. Now cancer free for 10 years, Pearce is participating at Cairns Airport IRONMAN Cairns on June 8 as her way of taking back control of her future.

"Completing IRONMAN is all about me finding the confidence to believe in myself again. I love the idea that no one can do this for me, but me," she said.

Pearce remembers learning the news about her cancer, which she had blocked out of her own mind.

"I flew out of town just hours after my biopsy. When the doctor called me the next day and told me I should come home, I kept asking him why. It wasn’t until I saw the ultrasounds showing just how wide spread the cancer was that it all hit home. It was the first time in my life I felt helpless."

She received one piece of advice that proved pivotal.

"That was no matter how sick chemotherapy makes you feel, walk around the block every day. I did this. I pushed myself to get out of the house. Some days it would take over an hour to walk less than a kilometre. Surviving cancer and enduring chemo is all about having the mental strength not to give up. I think IRONMAN is the same."

Pearce has since experienced the loss of her mother to the same disease, losing her battle seven years ago.

While Pearce is knows she’s in for a challenge on race day, she’s already proved that she is not afraid of a fight. She recalls the line that IRONMAN is one long tedious conversation with yourself.

"When it gets tough on the day, I plan on having that conversation and telling myself that I am way stronger than I think I am and the harder I push the quicker it’s over."

"What I am hoping for on race day is to cross the line totally and completely physically exhausted knowing I had nothing left. I don’t care what the clock says as long as I know that I pushed myself every step of the way and didn’t give up," she said.